Oh Captain, my Captain
by BlackBandit111
Summary: Silence. The sound of no sound. (Implied spirk, major character death.)


_For 1me and my thoughts1._

* * *

><p>Silence.<p>

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

He hated that word. That sound. The sound of no sound.

Silence.

It devoured him from the inside; left a strange tunnel feeling in its wake. Something akin to loneliness, something similar to loss, something that felt more like empty.

Silence.

It was peculiar, the sound of no sound, the silence of the halls, the floors, the walls. The sound of no sound.

Silence.

Usually there would be a beam of sunshine, a pure note of joy thrumming through the air, the presence of a friend to shine light in the shadows of their own inhibitions. Not now. Not with the sound of no sound.

Silence.

He dragged his fingers along the wall, wanted them to scrape and bleed so he might feel something other than this consuming self-hatred, the continuing spiral of something deep and dark inside of him, something he couldn't contain or descend into. He had to keep going, not for him- he would stop in a heartbeat if he so could- but for his friends, for the galaxy.

For him.

For he who was consumed within the sound of no sound.

Silence.

Jim was never silent.

But in death, it seemed he was.

Maybe silence wasn't the sound of no sound. Maybe death was.

If there's no one alive to hear a noise...does it make a sound?

Silence.

Death.

Silence.

The sound of no sound.

Death.

But death didn't suit Jim, who had been so full of love and life and happiness and selflessness. No one could ever say anything bad about Jim; he had always been chipper, always cheeky, always good. Good ol' Jim, they'd say one day.

But not today.

The air was cold, the stars bleak and unwelcoming as they glared upon the ship that was now without a captain. It reminded him of the poem spoken long ago for another captain, not a captain of a ship, not a captain of a crew, but a captain amongst friends. He wished he could remember how it went, that poem; it seemed right that the air was so frigid when Jim had brought so much warmth, and now the sun was gone.

But it would never rise.

Silence.

He wondered vaguely if he had done things differently if he could have prevented it. Maybe he could have avoided sending Jim in the first place. Maybe, if he had known, he could have died instead.

He wanted to die instead.

He wished he'd died instead.

The captain's chair on the bridge sits empty. No one dares claim it. No one else belongs in that particular chair, the chair that he had once sat in, the chair that he wished Jim sat in still, but he couldn't. Not now.

Never again.

The crew was quiet- heartbroken. The ship sat motionless in the vast void of space, once seeming welcoming, now seeming cruel and distant. The stars and planets that had once been so within his grasp now seemed to be unreachable.

Jim wished he could talk to him, tell him that what he was feeling wasn't what Jim would have wanted. Jim walked the halls, unseen, unheard.

Silent.

As silent as...well. Death.

Jim was dead. Jim knew he was dead.

And what the crew didn't know- what he didn't know- what no one could have possible fathomed or known was that Jim did still sit in the captain's chair. Jim chattered amongst them, the quiet ones, the mourning ones, the solemn. Jim joked, and laughed, and Jim's eyes crinkled in the corners.

But they were silent.

So was he.

And so was Jim.

Sometimes, Jim tried to get his attention. Tried to wave or shout or scream. Jim had tried to get everyone's attention- but Chekov grew into a man without knowing his captain was there, and Sulu was made chief explorer without knowing Jim was looking out for him and going on missions with him. Uhura continued to be flirted with, and didn't know that the time she couldn't get them to back off was the time that Jim stepped in for her.

And Joanna grew without knowing why her Uncle Jim didn't stop by anymore; and Bones grew without knowing why the world had claimed his boy so early. Scotty grew around his machines, not knowing that his captain was tinkering by his side.

And as they grew, they got older. Bones was the first to retire right after Joanna graduated college and made her way into the world.

(She hadn't known Jim had been there, beaming from ear to ear.)

Bones died after his sixtieth birthday. He had been alone, in bed.

Scotty died in an engineering accident. A pipe exploded. He'd pushed a younger recruit out of the way. He'd died amongst the machines he'd loved, still on the Enterprise.

Sulu was killed defending Chekov on a mission, and Pavel died because he refused to leave Hikaru's side. That was all they were, then, lying and bleeding and crying for each other and _please don't let go. Please don't let go._

When Uhura died, Jim Kirk's name was on her breath.

When he finally died, finally laid his head to rest and closed his eyes, he finally saw him standing there, waiting. Waiting all this time. Waiting with the sound of no sound.

"Come on home, Spock," Jim said with twinkling eyes, his hand extended and a smile on his lips. "Everyone's been waiting for you."

And he took Jim's hand and disappeared with him, into the joyful singing of the new, the free, the reborn and the rejoicing.

To everyone else, they went into the silence.


End file.
